Ikoria: Lair of Behemoths — Sundered Bond

Ikoria: Lair of Behemoths—Sundered Bond
Publishing Information
Author(s)	Django Wexler
First printing	April 7, 2020
ISBN-13	978-0786967162
Preceded By The Wildered Quest Followed By N/A

Ikoria: Lair of Behemoths—Sundered Bond is a novella written by Django Wexler, published as an e-book by Wizards of the Coast on April 7, 2020. It tells the story of the set of the same name.

Blurb

Lukka is a proud captain of the Coppercoats, the elite military force that defends Drannith from the savage monsters lurking outside its city walls. For the Coppercoats, the only good monster is a dead monster. Lukka's world is forever altered when he unexpectedly forms a mystical connection with a ferocious, winged cat. But such bonds are high crimes in Drannith, punishable by death. Running for his life, Lukka flees the very home he was sworn to protect. Now an outcast monster "bonder," Lukka must survive the wilds of Ikoria while being ruthlessly hunted by his former brothers-in-arms, including the sadistic General Kudro. With help from planeswalker Vivien Reid, can Lukka learn to tame his newfound powers before he wields vengeance--and an army of nightmarish monsters--against his beloved Drannith?

Story

The bonding

Lukka's special intervention squad is called upon to neutralize a monster, and they find out it is a winged tiger. It's smarter than any monster they've encountered. The cat kills three of his four squad members, only stopping when Lukka suddenly and unwilling bonds with the monster. He learns that it is being commanded to attack the city by a magical force, and gets an image of orange crystals. He passes out.

Outcast

When he wakes up he's in the hospital. Despite his fiancee Jirina's pleading, General Kudro decides that Lukka has to be imprisoned. Kudro has heard of people bonding with monsters, a fairly new thing, and he doesn't trust them. Jirina helps Lukka escape by faking her own kidnapping. The visiting planeswalker Vivien Reid senses some weird magic and investigates it, finding Lukka. The magic she was investigating was bonding magic. She scares off his pursuers.

Pursuit

Jirina is assigned the job of tracking down Lukka, being sent with a bunch of mercenary hunters. Lukka and Vivien find the winged tiger, in which Lukka has mixed feelings and knocks himself out again. A big crystal formation called the Ozolith turns out to be the source of a voice, an urge forcing monsters to attack Drannith. Jirina and the hunters find them, but they escape by riding the winged tiger (Lukka is awake again). The hunters decide they need an airship to follow the flying cat, so end up visiting the flying boat city of Skysail, where they hire a ship of skypirates.

Lukka and Vivien find some other bonders. Apparently monsters can communicate with each other via crystals. The bonders travel with Lukka and Vivien to the Ozolith.

The battle at the Ozolith

Everyone gets to the Ozolith and fights (Lukka, Vivien, bonders, hunters, pirates, and some Nightmares that are guarding the Ozolith). Lukka connects his mind to the crystal. He talks with whoever is using the crystals for nefarious purposes, they imply they are from a different plane. It also doesn't seem to care about the lives of people on this plane or to take responsibility for what it's done. It still decides to help Lukka and lets him use the Ozolith's power. He commands all the Nightmares to attack the hunters, which leads to the pirates fleeing. Lukka decides he wants to use this power to control monsters for the sake of Drannith. The bonders and Viviens aren't happy with this idea, as they see animals as friends, not slaves. Eventually, this gets to the point where Lukka decides to take control of the bonder's monsters. Vivien says she thought he was a good person, but that's too far and tries to fight him but has to flee with bonders while Lukka goes mad with power.

Marching on Drannith

Lukka loses track of the winged tiger, but it has rescued Jirina when the pirate ship was attacked by monsters. It flies her back to Drannith where it gets shot and captured, and she falls from it, getting seriously injured. Jirina wakes up in the infirmary. General Kudro wants to execute the winged tiger, but Jirina is against the idea because she thinks it's working with Lukka. General Kudro thinks executing it will get rid of whatever suspicion people have on Jirina after seeing her carried into the city by a monster, but it's also a test to see if Jirina is still loyal to the city or is on the side of the monsters now. Jirina is ordered to perform the execution but refuses.

Lukka tries to find Jirina with his growing army of monsters, but can't find her in the ruins of the pirate ship or anywhere else. One day he gets a vision from the winged tiger and sees Jirina refusing to execute it. He comes to understand that the winged tiger saved Jirina, even though Lukka he had never commanded it to. He understands that the winged tiger protected her because it knew Jirina was important to him. He then witnesses the winged tiger being executed. He gathers his monster army to march on Drannith but is apparently still intent on using the army to defend Drannith and win back his old life.

The death of Kudro

General Kudro thinks the oncoming monster army is a threat and plans on using his daughter as an unwilling weapon against Lukka. They march out to meet the monster army. Vivien and one of the bonders take out Jirina's guards to have a talk with her. They leave after she says she's a prisoner now and can't help them.

Lukka wants to parlay with General Kudro. The General agrees to it, but only so Lukka can be assassinated. He wants Jirina to do it, saying she'll be back in the good graces of the city if she does it. The meeting happens, Jirina refuses to kill Lukka and tells him that's what General Kudro wanted. Lukka calls his monsters to kill everyone but Jirina there. He stabs General Kudro to death himself. He thinks he'll be able to talk his way back into the city and its leadership. Jirina slashes at him but only grazes him, then jumps into a river to escape and gets washed away. Lukka calls her a traitor and says she can die too.

The fight for Drannith

Jirina is rescued by Vivien and the bonder. They mention Narset as someone who could help them, but don't know where she is. They meet up with another bonder and head towards Drannith. Jirina ends up taking control of the city's defenses, and many bonders agree to fight against Lukka.

In the fight, once things start to turn against Lukka, he tries to take control of all of the bonded monsters, but the power of love makes it harder. In the attempt, he ends up overloading the Ozolith and causes it to explode. This causes his planeswalker's spark to ignite and he planeswalks away.

Aftermath

Drannith rebuilds with more tolerance for bonders. Jirina is a colonel now. It is unknown who caused problems with the Ozolith in the first place. Lukka wakes up on another plane, still with a fraction of the power he had over creatures when channeling the Ozolith, and possibly still crazy. He vows to get home one day.